NEW HIGH-SPEED CAMERA WHICH CAN CAPTURE NEURON SIGNALS

A new type of ultrafast photography, called single-shot compressed ultrafast photography(CUP), can capture a picosecond laser pulse travelling through the air. CUP is one of the fastest cameras in the world which can capture neural signal in the brain. The researchers previously developed a "streak camera" that could image at speeds of 100 billion frames per second in single exposure-quick enough to capture pulses of light travelling through the space. The Scientists have now improved on this technique, called compressed ultrafast photography which is about 2.4 times of streak camera. This camera was designed in Washington University by LIHONG WANG, an applied physicist. In the latest work, the researchers started with streak camera-an extremely fast type of camera that captures pulse of light over the air. They next added a standard digital camera to their streak camera. With the upgraded system, the scientists captured images of laser pulses each just picoseconds as they travelled through air. This CUP camera is coupled with microscopes or telescopes. He and his colleagues are especially interested in using to watch neuron signal. Neural signals can propagate along nerves at speeds of over 100 meters per second. That kind of speed is too high for any current to capture. The researchers also hope to use their upgrade to analyze ultrafast biochemical reactions that occur within cells, and to study combustion in order to optimize fuel efficiency, said by wang.